


The Last Goodbye

by lovethecoat51



Category: Torchwood
Genre: M/M, Time Agency Days
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-07
Updated: 2015-02-07
Packaged: 2018-03-10 22:41:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 4,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3306053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lovethecoat51/pseuds/lovethecoat51
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Time Agency took away two years of Jack's memories - what happened when he found out? And how did he say goodbye to everything, even his lover?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

It was the start of a brand new term at the Time Academy. I hated those days with a passion. It meant the start of classes and tests and homework and worse…teaching all those idiotic students. Yes, instructors dread the first day of class as much as – if not more than – students. And being the combat instructor held an extra measure of danger for my physical well-being. Luckily, most students seemed to be as concerned as I was about keeping my naturally flawless body as perfect as possible, so they worked extra hard to not be the one to deface this particular Adonis.

Summers were much more fun. Most of the time, I was out on missions with John. One thing you gotta understand about being John’s partner was that one mission was normally enough adventure to last most people a lifetime. And yet, I couldn’t get enough. Another reason we worked so well together. That, and it certainly balanced out the monotony of _classes_. 

And this term wasn’t promising to be too interesting. A quick introduction in any of my classes included a small demonstration with one of the students, show them a few techniques they’d learn. It’d help me size up the class, see if they were going to be the normal bunch of pushovers I got stuck with. This term wasn’t boding well, only four students showed any real promise: Sarah, Lara, James, and Chris.

By the time I got back home, I was about ready for a  _real_  fight. John was wound up pretty tight, too, so it seemed that a fight was inevitable. Good.

“And then he just swans back in, all high and mighty, saying it was  _my_  fault that we lost the emerald. Where does he get off? There hasn’t been any around for  _years_  and they bloody well knew it when they hired us. They’re just lucky you managed to pull me out of there before I actually did some damage, because I was this close to blowing that overstuffed pigeon’s head off.”

“We got any milk?” I asked as I glanced up from the open refrigerator.

“Oi! You listening to me? Honestly, why do I even bother…”

“Because I am just that damn good looking.”

“Come here and I’ll show you exactly what I think of those looks.”

I smirked and stepped just within his reach. “Didn’t you do that this-”

His fist to my face stopped that particular train of thought, as pleasant as it promised to be.

I staggered back and felt the welt that was starting to form. “Oh, now you’re gonna get it.”

“Bring it on, pretty boy,” he dared. Like I was gonna let that slide.

He got his own punch to the jaw, quickly followed by one to the gut. I smirked as he straightened up and kicked a leg at me. I blocked it my own leg and shoved him back a step or two. He just glared at me and launched himself at me like a manic cannonball.

I easily grabbed him and slammed him against the wall and pinned him there. Not that hard when I’m taller  _and_  heavier than him. “That’s what you get for fighting the combat instructor.”

He hesitated a second – always a bad sign – then kicked a leg out, which connected with my knee, making me lose just enough concentration that he was able to shove me to the ground. Before I could even think, he was sitting squarely on my chest, pinning my arms down with his knees. He crossed his arms and grinned smugly down at me. “And  _that’s_  what you get for fighting someone who’s been with you twenty-six years.”

Twenty-six? When did he stop being able to count?

“Actually-” Another well-placed punched silenced my remark.

He wiggled a finger at me. “Now, now, Jack, you should know better than to argue with me when you’re in this position…”

I couldn’t help but smirk – even though it was a monumental effort with how fast my lip was swelling. “I dunno, I think I can do quite a bit from this position.”

“Well, right now, all you’re doing is talking.”

“Got a way of stopping me?”

“Got one in particular in mind at the moment…”

“That so? Think it’ll work?”

“It has in the past.”

And before I could say another word, he shut me up but good.


	2. Chapter 2

There was a knock on the door, and when I opened the door, I was greeted by some of the best curves I’ve ever laid eyes on. Lara.

“Hiya, Jack.”

“That’s Captain Harkness to you,” I smirked.

She smirked right back at me, tracing a finger down my chest as she walked past. “Maybe later on, babe.”

John strolled out at that moment. I groaned. “Really? You had to bleach your hair again? I thought we had this discussion. Several times.”

“Would you forget about yourself for a minute, you queen? I told you yesterday, I promised Lara.”

She draped an arm around him and laughed. “Aw, don’t you like it? I think he looks good.”

“I like him better with darker hair.” I smirked at him and added pointedly, “and he knows it. And what’s with the promises? You never make me promises.”

“Jealous, Jack?” Lara said as she pulled John closer to her.

I scoffed. “You wish. Still comes home to me when he’s done with you, doesn’t he?”

Lara glared and opened her mouth to say something, but John cut her off. “Alright, children, there’s enough John to go around. And you, big boy, start giving me a little incentive and I just might make you a promise.”

I  _really_  couldn’t help a smirk. “Promise?”

He scowled. “Oh, sod off. Come on, love,” he said as he focused his attention on Lara. “Time to pay up for the hair.”

She giggled and they started for the door. “See ya later, Jack.”

“Don’t miss me too much, sweetheart,” John called over his shoulder.

“In your dreams, Captain Peroxide,” I said as I shut the door behind them and made a mental note to put some serious thought into the whole “incentives” idea.  
  
\---  
  


Two days later, John stumbled back through the door, looking a bit worse for wear. He had a black eye, a busted lip, and a bandage on one arm. His shirt was torn at the collar and by the look of it, it hadn’t been off of him for more than five minutes in the past forty-eight hours. He staggered into the kitchen and started opening random cabinets, shoving things aside and making a bit too much noise even for me.

I smirked as I leaned against the wall, my arms crossed. “So, too much or too little to drink?”

He grabbed a bottle of vodka and took a long swig before he even acknowledged my presence. “Bloody rehab,” he said and went back to his bottle.

“That’s what, the third time now?”

“Fifth, actually. Honestly, you’d think they’d give up after the fourth time. Can’t they tell I’m a lost cause?”

“Not to mention, you’re especially nasty when you’re sober.”

“Save it all up for you,” he smirked. 

“Feeling better then?”

“Ha. Not by a long shot. Now get me to bed before I shoot something.”

“Anything else the princess wants?” I asked as I slung his arm around my neck.

“Now that you mention it, wouldn’t mind a bit of company.”

“You really think I’m gonna pass up a chance to take advantage of you in this weak and vulnerable state?”

“Who said I wanted your sorry ass?”

“Oh, I think the idea is that I get  _your_  sorry ass.”

He shook his empty bottle at me. “Need a bit more lubrication before I’m flexible enough for that, Harkness.”

“You’re such hard work.”

“But worth it,” he grinned.

“If you say so…” I said with a smirk as I unceremoniously dumped him on the bed.

“I  _know_  so.”

I laughed and kissed his forehead. “Well, don’t forget, got a party tonight. And people might start talking if I showed up without you.”

He threw me a confused look as I headed back to the kitchen for a few more bottles. And he says I’m high maintenance…


	3. Chapter 3

That evening was the traditional “holy shit, the new term has started and I didn’t think it was possible to hate my students more than last term but look at that, I do” faculty party. Basically, we all just get together and bitch. Always a good time. 

I was standing with John and four other instructors, regaling them with one of my stories. “So he’s pinned to the desk, crying like a Lucidean hound, when he, out of nowhere, starts cursing at me in Veltinon. And I say to him, ‘my legs are longer than that, so show a little respect!’”

A rousing round of laughter followed, as usual.

I scanned the crowd. “So where’s Rich? He never misses one of these.”

They just gaped at me. 

“What, do I have something on my face?”

“Jack, he died last year,” Amanda said.

“What?” I could’ve sworn I talked to him just last week…

“In a botched mission on Mastil. His partner sold him out.”

“What?!”

“You’ll have to excuse Jack tonight, they grabbed me off the streets again for rehab and you know how helpless he is without me,” John said casually as he grabbed my arm and pulled me to an empty corner. He glanced around and lowered his voice. “Jack, what’s going on ?”

“What’d you mean?”

“You’re all…off. Have been for days. Do you even realize what tomorrow is?”

I blinked at him. “Tuesday…?”

He scowled. “That does it. Tomorrow’s the anniversary of the invasion of the peninsula. I normally have to drag you out of bed just to get you to class. You’re never in the mood to so much as leave the flat, let alone go to a party. Now  _what_  is going on?”

“What? No, it’s not, that’s months away.”

“Jack-”

“John, I think I know what day it is.”

“Oh, you think? Alright, tell me, big boy, what day is it?”

“August 22nd.” His jaw tensed. I felt a smug little smile creep across my face. “See? I told-”

“Check your wrist strap.”

“What?”

“Check. Your. Bloody. Wrist strap,” he growled.

An irritated sigh escaped as I flipped open my wrist strap to check the date. It wasn’t the 22nd; it wasn’t even August. In fact, it wasn’t even the  _year_  I thought it was.

John put a hand on my arm to steady me. “See what I mean?”

“We gotta get outta here,” I managed to get out. He nodded, and gave me a second to pull myself together before we went and said our goodbyes to everyone.


	4. Chapter 4

By the time we got back to our flat, the effects of the booze and good company had completely worn off and I wasn’t doing so well. I all but collapsed onto the sofa and John sat down next to me, pulling my head into his lap – and no, not for that. Every once in a great while, he’s not thinking about sex. 

He kept running his fingers through my hair, trying to force me to relax. I don’t know how long we sat there, not saying anything, because really, what was there to say? “Hey, sorry you can’t remember a damn thing and have no idea how in the hell it happened”? That doesn’t really cover it.

But John’s patience ran out long before my mood did and he cleared his throat. “So…what’s the last mission you remember?”

“I remember going to Braxis a few days ago…”

He paled a little and his hand stopped. If I hadn’t been so upset in the first place, I might have protested the sudden lack of attention. “Jack, that was over two years ago.”

"What?!" If I wasn't already panicking, that certainly set me off. I thought I was missing two, three months at the most. Not two years. "And you're sure I'm on the right timeline?"

"Been here the whole time."

"So no time travel." 

He shook his head slowly. 

"Alien illness?"

"Strange symptoms, memory loss but nothing else."

"But there's nothing at the Agency that can do that, just erase time. There's not even anything in R&D like that."

"You sure about that?"

"Yeah, last I knew they were working on a better vortex manipulator."

John held up his wrist. "Looking at the prototype right here."

"You swiped it, didn't you."

"Like you really had to ask."

"So they're still scrambling to rebuild it?"

"Yup. No way are they working on memory-altering tech."

"And therefore we still have no idea what happened to me. Fantastic."

“There was one thing," he said slowly. "I was down in the labs-”

“What were you doing in the labs? You’re not exactly good with science.”

“There’s a pretty new lab assistant.”

“Oh Jesse, right? With the brown hair and the teeth?”

“ _Anyway_ , heard them talking about something called retcon. Apparently, it messes with your memory, blocks out chunks of time. Think someone slipped you some, mate.”

“Oh, great, now I’m just a lab rat.”

He smirked at me. “You’re normally the first one to suggest experimentation…” I glared him. “Not the time?”

“Not even close.”

“Still don’t know why you’re making such a fuss, I can’t remember half my nights anyway.”

I shot him a look. “There’s a difference between drug- and alcohol-induced blackouts and someone slipping you retcon or whatever. Kinda like there’s a difference between sex and rape.”

He almost looked bothered. “You still got nothing to worry about. I’ve been with you the whole bloody time.”

“The whole time? Really? Every single second?” He just glared at me. “What about the times I was alone?”

He snorted. “Jack, you’re never alone.”

“John.”

He looked at me for a moment, not moving a muscle. I was about to just beg already when his eyes shifted to the window. “No, I can’t tell you where you were every single second, but I know you, Jack. You didn’t do anything against your stupid little honor code. You’re not me, for Christ’s sake.”

I sat up so fast I almost smacked John in the face. “But that’s just it, you don’t know that. I don’t know who I talked to, if I had an important debriefing last week, if there’s a bounty on my head. How am I supposed to go on with my life when part of it is missing?”

“Don’t you think you’re overacting a little?”

“No, I don’t!” I said and stood up, pacing the room. “I’m supposed to be the face of the Agency, one of their poster boys. I can’t do that if I trust them less than the people who hire us.”

“Jack, it’s the Time Agency,” he said as he rolled his eyes. “You know as well as I do, they’re not as squeaky clean as they’d like you to think.”

“But they’re still stealing it from me. And it’s not like some stupid like a diamond or anything. It’s my life. I can’t get it back. Ever.”

There was a long pause before either of us spoke. John was the first to break the silence, but his voice was still quiet when he did. “So what’re you gonna do?”

Now there was a question. As far as I could tell, I only had three options. One, I could just carry on with my life like nothing happened. And that clearly wasn’t an option. I was never good at separating things like that for any amount of time. Sure, I could lie with the best of them, but something this serious? No, couldn’t do that for more than a few days. Not with a betrayal this big.

Another choice was to bring it up to my superiors. Of course, the problem with that idea was that I didn’t know why I’d been slipped the retcon, and there was no guarantee that they wouldn’t nod their heads politely, tell me they’d look into it, and wipe my mind again. And then I’d have to live this nightmare over again. So that clearly wasn’t what I should do.

My last option? Run. Run far and run fast. Which is what I told John.

He scoffed. “And what makes you think you can get away with it? You  _know_  what happens to deserters around here. They get rewarded with a trip to Floor 500, if you know what I mean.”

“I don’t really have any other choice, John.”

“So because you can’t remember a patch of time, you’re just gonna turn your back on everything? On everyone? On-” He cut himself off with a scowl and turned to look out the window. I watched his jaw tense and his fists clench, and I was glad I was out of arm’s reach at that particular moment. “You’re making a mistake, Jack.”

Why the hell was he getting so upset about this? It’s not like they’re his memories that were just stolen away from him, time he’s never gonna get back, experiences he’ll never-

Oh.

“Hey,” I crossed the room, knelt down, and cupped his face in my hands. “I’m not going anywhere without you. Promise.”

He visibly relaxed at those words and leaned into the touch. Guess he forgot he’s not the only one here who can lie better than is entirely healthy.


	5. Chapter 5

A few days passed. Life when back to normal. Or at least appeared to. I taught my classes, went out with people, put on a show of adapting to this new knowledge (or lack of knowledge, depending on how technical you wanted to get). No one asked, I never said a thing. But the more I stayed there, the more I was determined I had to leave.

And the more I was determined that John couldn’t come with me.

The night finally came where I knew I couldn’t stand much more and had to do something about it. Part of me wanted to cut ties completely, just wake up one morning and disappear. But there was no way I’d be able to live with myself if I did that. 

So I decided to give John a night to remember. It was the least I could do, really.

And when he sauntered into our flat that evening to find me in the kitchen  _cooking_ , he was only a tad suspicious.

“Well, this is new…”

“What? Can’t I try to romance you?”

“Maybe if we’re about to fly straight into a supernova.”

For a split second, I thought he saw right through me. If anyone could, it would have been John. I rolled my eyes, half-hoping he was still oblivious. “Well, if you’d rather not have a night that’s all about you…”

He grinned and rubbed his hands together maniacally. “Oh, you know I’m all for a night that’s all about me. Did you finally invite those triplets in your class over?”

“No, actually, I thought just you and me tonight.”

His eyes dimmed just a touch. 

“You know, if I didn’t know better, I’d say you were disappointed…”

“No, no,” he added quickly. “Just you and me, that could be…fun.”

“Again with the disappointment…”

“Oh, come on, you tell me it’s a night all about me and then say  _you’re_  the only one here? What angle are you playing at?”

“It’s just…” I paused, trying to find something that didn’t sound incredibly lame. Nothing came. “You’ve done a lot for me. Especially these past few days. I wanted to thank you. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

After that brief and painful moment of honesty, I was almost wishing that he’d see the lies, that he’d call me on this bullshit and do something – anything – to keep me here. Preferably involving heavy chains and leather straps.

But he didn’t.

“Sweet Goddess, I hate it when you get all sentimental,” he smirked, his face telling me the complete opposite.

“Just shut up and come here already.”

The smirk only widened. “Your dinner’s gonna burn.”

“You weren’t gonna enjoy it anyway.”

“That’s ‘cos you’re a crap cook.”

“What can I say, my talents lie elsewhere."

“These other talents, am I gonna get a sample of them tonight?”

“If you’d shut up for half a second.”

That night we made love. It wasn’t lust, it wasn’t sex, it was something more, something deeper. He needed to  _know_  how much I cared about him, how much I loved him, and it wasn’t enough to just tell him (which I did several times during the evening), I had to prove it to him. Words just weren’t enough. In that moment, he was most important thing in the universe to me, and I took it to heart to show him that, because tomorrow life was going to hit him and hit him hard.

And it was all my fault.


	6. Chapter 6

When I woke up, the sun still hadn’t risen. Pitch black and ice cold. It seemed strangely fitting. I got dressed as quietly as I could, and it wasn’t until I was lacing up my boots that it hit me: this was it. From here on out, I wasn’t me anymore. Everything I had before was just going to be a distant memory.

Assuming they didn’t track me down and take  _those_  memories from me, too.

I glanced back at John’s sleeping figure and tried to suppress a smirk. He was gonna hate me soooo much when he got up and realized what I’d done. But it was better than risking his life along with mine, and that was the only thought that kept me going. I didn’t want to start thinking about all the pain I was gonna cause him, because that’d be just about enough to make me stay. And I couldn’t do that.

So instead, I leaned over and lightly kissed his cheek, trying to keep from waking him. I did  _not_  blink back tears as I whispered “I love you,” but he shifted at those words, and the little shit trapped my hand under his shoulder. I wiped an eye as I bit back a laugh and thought only John would be able to make my life insanely difficult while fast asleep.

I eased him up, trying to keep him asleep. He was such a lightweight, though, it wasn’t too hard to get away. I actually made it all the way to the front door before the guilt hit me. This wasn’t right, no matter how hard I tried to convince myself of it. I rested my forehead on the doorframe, trying to pull myself together. I had to leave, there really wasn’t a choice. I knew John wouldn’t see it that way, he made that crystal clear when I mentioned it. 

I couldn’t just  _leave_ , though. Especially after last night. I didn’t want him to think I had been grabbed or abducted or anything like that, didn’t want him to be hounding our superiors to tell him where the fuck I was until they finally got so sick of him that they either chained him up or just flat out killed him. No, I had to let him know this was my decision, as much as that would hurt. 

I fished through my pockets and found the only thing of any value: a stupid little ring I picked up during one of our little “side trips” in the Wilend galaxy. It wasn’t much, just a little green stone with gold petals around it, but I liked it. Of course, it also had a tracking device in it, making it that much more valuable and therefore catching John’s eye.

This was perfect. I pressed it to my lips and then laid it down on the counter. Now he couldn’t follow me. He would know this was final. 

I glanced around the room one last time. “Goodbye, John.”

And then I shut the door and ran like hell.


End file.
